Infineon loss widens on DRAM slump

Infineon's loss grew to 523 million euros ($466 million) during its Q4, 41 per cent worse than the previous three-month period.

This time last year, the memory maker posted a profit of 581 million euros. For 2000 as a whole, Infineon earned 1.3 billion euros. This time round, it reported an operating loss of 931 million euros. Factor in one-offs and the figure grows to 1.02 billion euros, thanks in part to a 117 million euro restructure charge and a 142 million euro inventory write-down.

Sales during the quarter fell 54 per cent year-on-year to 1.09 billion euros. Memory-derived revenue fell almost 80 per cent.

Looking ahead, Infineon will continue to cut costs - part of a programme to save the company one billion euros - through to the end of fiscal 2002. That suggests the company has little optimism that a recovery in the chip market is going to happen time soon.

And if the company pursues its talks with Toshiba, Mosel Vitelic, Nanya and Winbond about merging some or all of these companies' DRAM operations with its own, its losses are likely to continue to grow. The upside is that it will be in a stronger position when the memory market recovery does take place. ®